The global extreme poverty rate has
fallen by half since 1990, but progress within the
developing world has been uneven. Extreme poverty remains
widespread in most low-income countries while many
middle-income countries also continue to have substantial
levels with many people there who have escaped extreme
poverty remaining poor and vulnerable. Nor has there been
robust progress in sharing prosperity: in many developing

As the 21st century unfolds, the vast
nation of India faces an array of challenges, including how
to feed its burgeoning population in a situation where rural
poverty is widespread and land resources are under mounting
pressure. In such a situation it is vital that the resources
supporting agriculture (especially rain-fed arable farming)
- soil and water, physical infrastructure, and those
employed on the land operate efficiently and in harmony. Two

This study uses a newly compiled database of women's property rights and legal capacity covering 100 countries over 50 years to test for the impact of legal reforms on employment, health, and education outcomes for women and girls. The database demonstrates gender gaps in the ability to access and own property, sign legal documents in one's own name, and have equality or non-discrimination as a guiding principle of the country's constitution. In the initial period, 75 countries had gender gaps in at least one of these areas and often multiple ones.

Although a high rate of urbanization and
a high incidence of rural poverty are two distinct features
of many developing countries, there is little knowledge of
the effects of the former on the latter. Using a large
sample of Indian districts from the 1983-1999 period, the
authors find that urbanization has a substantial and
systematic poverty-reducing effect in the surrounding rural
areas. The results obtained through an instrumental variable

Since 2006, there has been an explosion
of Payments for Environmental Services (PES) projects in
Brazil, as well as efforts to pass PES laws at federal,
state, and municipal levels. Even in this short period, an
extraordinarily rich range of experiences has developed,
with examples of the application of PES at a variety of
scales, ranging from microwatersheds to entire states; in a
variety of contexts, from remote forest frontier areas to

The importance of agriculture in the
economies of sub-Saharan African countries cannot be
overemphasized. With agriculture accounting for about 65
percent of the region's employment and 75 percent of
its domestic trade, significant progress in reducing hunger
and poverty across the region depends on the development and
transformation of the agricultural sector. Transforming
agriculture from largely a subsistence enterprise to a

Agriculture remains fundamental for
Nicaragua from both a macroeconomic and social view. It is
the largest sector of the Nicaraguan economy, and it remains
the single biggest employer with around 30 percent of the
labor force and including processed foods, like meat and
sugar, agriculture accounts for around 40 percent of total
exports value. Nicaragua appears to be gradually losing
competitive edge of some of its key agricultural exports

This paper revisits the identification
of the binding constraints to investment and growth in
Pakistan by rigorously applying the growth diagnostic
framework. It has a central finding: Pakistan's
economy faces two major groups of constraints emerging and
structural. The emerging constraints include infrastructure
(energy) deficit, high macro-fiscal risks, and inadequate
international financing (high country risks and low FDI

The Congo Basin represents 70 percent of
the African continent's forest cover and constitutes a
large portion of Africa's biodiversity. Agricultural
development is a central lever to help people out of
poverty, as well as a key driver of deforestation.
Forest-friendly agricultural development is a challenge for
the region. This report describes some ways forest-friendly
agricultural development can materialize in the Congo Basin.

Donors could assist in clarifying the
role, building the capacity, and potentially helping to
secure funding of key disaster risk management organizations
in Ghana. Engagement in Ghana to develop private sector
property catastrophe risk and agriculture insurance should
be seen as a medium term engagement. Banking penetration is
low, as is insurance and micro-insurance penetration, even
when compared to regional countries. That said, Ghana has

This volume presents a synthesis of the multi-country collaborative program of analytical and advisory activities titled reducing vulnerability to climate change in European and Central Asian (ECA) agricultural systems. Climate change and its impacts on agricultural systems and rural economies are already evident throughout the ECA region. Adaptation measures now in use in the region-largely piecemeal efforts-would be insufficient to prevent impacts on agricultural production over the coming decades.

In September 2013, the World Bank
launched the second Zambia economic brief, entitled
Zambia's jobs challenge: realities on the ground. This
report presents response of the youth to the facts and
figures shared in the Zambia economic brief. It gives a
broad range of discussion, often provocative, as to how
Zambia's employment challenges can be tackled. It
discusses the issues as diverse as cultural mind-set,